MMOs Are Back In My Rotation!

I kind of fell out with MMOs for a bit. Back in December I had a million new single player games from the Steam Sale taking up my leisure time. In January I just kind of lost the urge to play games, and instead I spent most of my hobby time trying to cook the perfect chili. (FYI: No beans, lots of home-roasted chili peppers.) I think that happens often in long-term hobbies though, and I figured the urge to play games would return when it was ready.

Boy, was I ever right. I now find myself involved to some degree with three different MMOs at the same time!

Before Christmas I hit 60, the new level cap, in RIFT, and I was sort of feeling directionless. Fortunately around then I also joined the RIFT chapter of AIE, and those good folks recently started organizing retro raids of “Chocolate RIFT” content that most of us had never seen in its prime. My love of group content is no secret, but even I was surprised by how revitalizing it was to spend two hours running around killing dudes with 19 other pleasant people on Ventrilo. The bosses weren’t hard, but doing something that vaguely resembled raiding put a spring in my virtual step.

I’ve logged on RIFT regularly since then, my interest in character development renewed. I’m also looking for more large group event opportunities, as clearly that’s where my heart lies in a “main MMO”.

But as I wrote about earlier this week, not every day is right for engaging content. Sometimes you just wanna run around and kill some junk, and for those times there’s World of Warcraft. Liore (the original Liore!) is up to level 87, and currently.. defending turnips from evil rabbits, as far as I can tell. The quests in Pandaria are occasionally less than epic in scope.

Surprise, war is bad! A Sha thingy.

I enjoyed the Jade Forest plotline, in the first expansion zone, although I think it highlighted one of the problems with standard MMO questing which is that we’re really just helpless bystanders in the story. I knew right away that creating armies of monkey dudes and fish people to fight each other would cause nothing but problems, but no one asked me! There also seem to be more cut scenes so far in Pandaria questing than in previous expansions, and again I feel like it’s just wresting control of my own character from me for the most part. (It ain’t no Wrathgate.)

What the heck, Blizz?

My loose WoW plans are to “12433” my way to level 90 whenever I get the fancy to play. I have no idea what will happen then, but I’m not worrying about it either.

BUTTS

MMO producers and business people, if you’ve ever wondered about the true power of social ties when it comes to getting people to play your game, ponder this: I, Liore, renowned hater of catgirls in tiny skirts, downloaded and occasionally play TERA entirely because an awesome friend is enthusiastic about it and I want to hang out with them. The power of peers, ladies and gentlemen! The game went free-to-play a couple of days ago, so in my defense at least I’m not paying for it.

TERA, if you’re not already familiar with it, was likely based on the stolen codebase of Lineage 3, which means it’s strong in the tradition of grindy Asian MMOs. It is also ludicrously obsessed with sexualizing the female figure. My goat-lady started out in a skirt with NO BACK. Look design people, if I wanted to stare at lady ass every moment of my gaming I would put a mirror on my chair.

Aw yeah statue booty

The mildly concerning “little girl” race aside, truth be told the male gaze in TERA’s design is so over the top that I find it hard to take seriously or offensively. I mean look, even their fountains are suggestive! It’s pretty hysterical, if eye-rolling.

The gameplay thus far (at my advanced age of level 5) is.. grindy! I have a Sorcerer (mage) who shoots things with spells. The much vaunted “action combat” is essentially circle-strafing although it certainly requires more movement than the average “hotbar” driven MMO.

But hey, as I said before the player company is great, and that is what counts in any MMO.

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3 Comments

Talarian

February 8, 2013

Interestingly enough in TERA, if my memory serves, even the men were pretty hyper-sexualized. It’s not just a power fantasy (which is pretty typical), but flat out hellllllo nurse kinda deal. At least, running around with my sexy male fighter wearing armor that amounted to effectively a harness felt like that. Not that I’m complaining, I’ll personally take equal opportunity ogling. Bring on the scantily clad men!

I guess hysterical is the right word for TERA’s character models; you just have to roll with the whole deal and not ask too many questions in order to get a look at it. that picture of the statue lol….*no words*

Happy to hear you’re enjoying yourself again with different MMOs. they always catch up with us in the end – or so I find. :) I’m mostly playing two right now and while a part of me still thinks I should be dedicated to only ‘teh one’, I actually find lots of enjoyment doing different things in different games. it works for me right now.Syl´s last post: Weekend Challenge: MMO Poetry Scrabble (with a prize)!

Good to see you getting an MMO stride back. I too was surprised by Tera. I’d read about the controversies and the awful advert campaign. But actually what it does, it does very well. The combat is actually something different and given that most MMOs are very combat-heavy anyway that’s a good thing.